It is vital that cost effective techniques be used to determine the most likely location of hydrocarbon deposits, so that valuable oil and gas can be recovered from the fewest number of wells.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,476,716 discloses techniques for predicting the likelihood of oil and gas deposits, and specifically discloses the generation of surface temperature data and atmospheric temperature data, and also generation of sub surface temperatures.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,244,483 discloses a technique involving measuring the earth surface temperature at a plurality of locations during a time when ambient conditions are similar to minimize the variability of earth surface temperature and changes in ambient conditions. U.S. Pat. No. 5,281,024 discloses techniques for locating porous and permeable soils having high percolation rates, recognizing that in the summer daytime sunshine, higher surface temperatures are more likely at locations with permeable soils at depth.
In spite of the advances made to accurately locate hydrocarbon deposits on a cost effective basis. There is a gray area of interpretation, and further improvements are necessary to provide more uniformity, so that essentially the same data is obtained when measurements are taken with extended lapses between the measurement periods. Also, more accurate data may be used to more precisely locate and define the size of the hydrocarbon deposits.